Words You've Learned Recently

[Jonlang]

Welsh
och(e)neidio
sighing

IIRC it's a groaning kind of sigh, like when someone asks you to do something you really don't want to, rather than the kind of sigh one may do when disappointed or when bracing one's self.

[Linguoboy]

Remis stalemate (chess)

[Salmoneus]

Thanks to the tree discussion...

rowen - stubble field left unplowed until late Autumn so that it may be cropped by cattle
mazer - type of drinking vessel (also a maple)

[dɮ the phoneme]

Japanese
無政府主義
museifushugi
"anarchism"

I had expected it to be 無政主義, but I was corrected.

[Salmoneus]

Serendip - Sri Lanka.

And yes, it's where 'serendipity' comes from.

[Linguoboy]

Serendip - Sri Lanka.

Shameless plug: A friend of mine is self-publishing a book of Sri Lankan recipes. It's called A taste of Serendib.

A Canadian friend ended a rant about the power company with Asti de peuple gratteux! I messaged him asking for a translation and discovered that asti represents [ˌəsˈt͡si], which is a colloquial form of ostie (a common sacre). Gratteux means "stingy", from the expression gratter la cenne lit. "scratch the cent". A gratteux can also be a scratch-off lottery card.

[jal]

Now reading an article that has both "obstreperous" and "obdurate" in a single sentence. I don't think I've ever encountered these words before...


JAL

[Linguoboy]

Now reading an article that has both "obstreperous" and "obdurate" in a single sentence. I don't think I've ever encountered these words before...

I use the former often but only in the extended sense of "uncooperative or disobedient in a disruptive manner". (In fact, I never even realised it had the literal sense of "boisterous".)

Today I just learned about tabby in the sense of a kind of concrete made with oyster shells. I'm not sure if I've seen any examples in real life or not.

[Pabappa]

Polish apparently has zasilacz for "power adapter". It took me a while to figure out that I was even looking at translations since the first word (even before the English) was "Alimentation".

[TomHChappell]

I learned what harled stone is, and what harling is.
I’ll bet you can guess which series I’m reading!

[TomHChappell]

“Fleam” is a new word to me.
It’s pretty much a drastic contraction of “phlebotome”.
It’s an instrument used in phlebotomy.
(Or venipuncture.)

—————

Man, how does Diana Gabaldon even have room in her head for all these words?

[Salmoneus]

From a RWV song I posted in the other thread: I'd probably encountered the word "lave" before, maybe even looked it up, but if I did I'd forgotten about it.

[a crowd, or the remainder; also to wash (which I did know), to draw up water, to bail or throw out, to give bountifully, to hang or flap, or to gutter]

[Pabappa]

I had a dream in the mid to late 90s where "lave" meant "something used by a seller to dissuade a customer from making a purchase; a negative incentive". The context was my mother playing a kids' TV show which I liked at the time, but which she considered so bad that it would scare off the person she was meeting with from making some deal they were expecting (unspecified in the dream).

[TomHChappell]

From a RWV song I posted in the other thread: I'd probably encountered the word "lave" before, maybe even looked it up, but if I did I'd forgotten about it.

[a crowd, or the remainder; also to wash (which I did know), to draw up water, to bail or throw out, to give bountifully, to hang or flap, or to gutter]

I thought the crowd meaning was just “rave” pronounced with an accent.

[Linguoboy]

I have a friend updating regularly from WorldCon in Dublin and she posted a picture of a menu that mentioned "salty fingers". I asked what those were and she said, "Samphire". So now I know not only that they eat halophytes in the UK and Ireland but a couple of local names for them.

[alynnidalar]

"salty fingers"
"Samphire"
halophytes

I don't know any of these words

[Salmoneus]

"Salty fingers"? Never heard of that.

"Samphire" is the traditional word. Although it was only really popularised in the UK maybe... ten years ago? [I remember it being in a popular cookery show and everyone loving it, and then suddenly showing up in shops, but I suspect it's not quite such a simple cause-and-effect as that might imply]

I think samphire's one of those things that always used to be on the occasional restaurant menu, and was a traditional thing to eat in some areas, but wasn't really part of most people's lives. But in recent times, there's been quite a sort of semi-nationalist culinary phenomenon, whereby traditional British food is rediscovered as something to be proud of, rather than our previous congenital inferior complex as regards the French being superior in all ways. You get lots more traditional recipes and an emphasis on good, local ingredients (there are even gourmet bangers-and-mash restaurants). Samphire really fitted in to that mold. Although it's certainly not ubiquitous yet - it's in the supermarkets, and often encountered in restaurants, but I think most people don't really know about it (so, a similar level of popularity to, say, celeriac?).

One downside is that while samphire is delicious, it can have almost twiggy bits in, and I think that as it's become more popular, and farming of it has become more mainstream, the quality has gone down, and you get a lot more thin and twiggy samphire now. But the young, fleshy stuff is great!

It used to be called 'sea fennel' as well, but that seems to have died out as people have become accustomed to the name 'samphire'.

[Qwynegold]

Ichthyocentaur

[Qwynegold]

Obstetrician (doctor specialized in childbirth). I know I've looked this word up before, but I just can't remember what it is. Hopefully it'll stay in my head this time.

[Chuma]

English
Must
"Fresh pressed fruit juice"

Typically used in English for grape juice that you're about to make wine from. But it delights me, because we use the same word in Swedish, with a slightly different connotation; basically "high quality juice, particularly apple juice". I have missed having a word for it in English (although a word that doesn't have such an obvious other meaning would have been nicer).